


Broken Promises

by bossxtweed



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, Family, missy appears except it's not really her it's the TARDIS interface
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-08
Updated: 2020-07-08
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:26:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25138420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bossxtweed/pseuds/bossxtweed
Summary: While the Doctor took Missy, Nardole, and Bill off to test his oldest friend, Genevieve stayed behind in the Doctor's office, waiting for them to return.She waits.And waits.And waits.Until, one day, amanappears.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 6





	Broken Promises

_ We’ll only be gone a few hours,  _ the Doctor had said.  _ I need to  _ **_test_ ** _ your mum, see if she’s really become a better person or not. _

For Genevieve, it never mattered that the Master was  _ evil--- _ they were her parent, her mum, and only ever regarded her with kindness and  **_love,_ ** and she had agreed to  _ wait,  _ even though being alone worsens her anxiety and makes her want to scream as memories torture her.

She occupies herself with the language books her mum had given her, using recordings to repeat the foreign sounds and tracing the letters with her index finger. One day, maybe, her mum would take her to Gallifrey. There would she lay down in the red soil and look up at the silver trees and the twin suns, with her mum at her side, telling her stories of a childhood long gone.

Hours drag into days, which melt into weeks, which fade into a  _ year,  _ and still the Doctor’s blue box hasn’t returned. There is talk amongst the university’s admin that they should declare the Doctor no longer an employee and empty out his office and put his things in storage should he decide to return one day, but Genevieve insists they leave it alone---the Doctor  _ will  _ return, and messing with his things would only serve to make him  _ angry,  _ so  **_why_ ** can’t they just  **_leave it alone?!_ **

The grandfather clock seems to have  _ moved  _ every time one of them enters his office. And always,  _ always,  _ there stands the little girl, her arms crossed against her chest, and with one withering look she gets the offending party to  _ leave  _ without further argument. 

She sits now in the console room with painting supplies spread out on the floor: a large canvas over newspaper, brushes of various sizes, and a variety of paints, mostly purples. Music blasts throughout the room, loud enough to shake the clock where it sits on the mantle in the Doctor’s office.

Half-done on the canvas: mother and daughter, arm in arm, standing beneath a bright orange sky. 

Static crackles and Geni groans. Without looking up, she says, “not now.”

Missy  _ loved  _ herself, and it had been only natural that her TARDIS’ interface would choose  _ her  _ to present itself as, and in a simulated voice it says, “you have been awake for thirty-six-and-a-half hours. Recommendation: sleep.”

“Oh, shut  _ up!”  _ Geni cries and she throws her still-wet paintbrush at the image. “You’re  **_nae_ ** m’ mum!”

The image wavers and disappears. 

_ We’ll only be gone a few hours,  _ the Doctor had said, but those hours had melted into a year, and Genevieve is starting to lose hope.

_ One day,  _ she thinks, staring down at her painting.  _ One day, we’ll go there, you and I.  _

_ One day we’ll go home. _

Two years pass and the university’s administration begin to believe that Genevieve is a delinquent, never going to school and living in the Doctor’s office, only they can never  _ find her  _ whenever they go looking---she’ll appear in the windows one moment and in the next will have disappeared, though no one ever admits to seeing her pass them in the hallways. 

Finally, she hears the tell-tale  _ whoosh  _ of the Doctor’s ship and she practically jumps out of her mum’s TARDIS and into the office. 

“Doctor!” she exclaims, only the person standing in front of her is  _ not  _ the grey-haired Scotsman, but rather a younger, blonde white woman, who stares back at her with wide eyes.

“Genevieve?” the woman breathes. “I---”

The girl runs up and wraps her arms around the Doctor. “It’s  _ so  _ good to see you, but---mum---”

“Genevieve,” she replies, pulling back. “I’m--I’m  _ so sorry,  _ but she’s gone. I---it---it all went wrong, and---”

“No!” Geni shouts. “She  _ can’t  _ be dead! You’re  _ lying!”  _

“Genevieve,  _ believe me,  _ if there was anything---”

The girl swipes her arms, throwing picture frames and stacks of paper off the Doctor’s desk, and the Time Lord merely stares at her, helpless.

“You  **_promised_ ** to bring her back! You  **_promised!”_ **

The Doctor’s lips part but no sound comes out. She shakes her head. Holds her hands up, fingers curled inwards, and bites her lip.

This wasn’t supposed to happen.

The past sneaks up on everyone, slowly and quietly, speaking the language of nostalgia and battering away years of defenses, and the past had conquered the Master. If the Doctor were honest with herself, she could still feel the tingle of Missy’s hand in her own, could still see the pain and anguish in her best friend’s eyes as the Time Lady left her alone.

Missy had abandoned them  _ both  _ on that wretched day.

“She’s _gone,_ Geni. Even---even **_if_** she survived somehow, she’d be **_different._** Different _face,_ different _attitudes,_ different _person,_ and they might not recognize you as theirs anymore.”

“Stop!” Geni rushes towards the Doctor and shoves her to the ground with a surprising amount of strength.

_ She’s  _ **_twelve_ ** _ and having to fight for herself,  _ she thinks, and sorrow pangs in her hearts. Small fists fly against her chest and she doesn’t move, letting Geni get her frustration out, just as the Doctor had done in that marketplace.

Tired, the girl collapses to the ground and cries. 

Awkwardly, the Doctor whispers, “I’m  _ so  _ sorry, Geni. Really, I am, but she’s gone. Missy….. Missy’s gone.”

“She  _ can’t  _ be!” Geni’s tears muffle her voice and she weakly slams a fist against the worn carpet. “She  **_can’t_ ** be! Mum…”

Despite the aching in her hearts, the Doctor stands and shuffles her things into her TARDIS, occasionally stopping to admire an old photograph or to wonder at an old essay or faculty notice, and she awkwardly pats the girl on the shoulder before setting off, having cleared out her office.

Alone again, Genevieve cries herself into an uncomfortable sleep. 

In her dreams she sees her mum, smiling softly at her, her blue eyes tear-filled as she regards her little girl, and she reaches out, wanting to touch her, only they’re too far apart, just as they were when the girl was three and those agents had taken her.

Too far, too far, too far.

_ “Mum!”  _ she cries out, struggling to move forward through a thick, solid fog.  _ “Mum! Please! I---I  _ **_need_ ** _ you!” _

Somewhere, after fleeing Gallifrey in the brief moments before the Death Particle took effect, the Master stops, feeling a pang in his hearts as a psychic message worms its way into his mind.

_ “Mum! Please! I---I  _ **_need_ ** _ you!” _

It is the voice of his little girl, his darling Genevieve, and regret weighs heavily on him as he sets the coordinates of his TARDIS.

“I’m coming for you, my love.”

She startles awake at a wheezing groan and prepares herself to yell at the Doctor again, but the doors open and she instead sees someone  _ familiar--- _ the same man who had brought her back to her mum two years before, with sad brown eyes and brown skin lighter than her own, and she hesitates before saying, “you’re---you’re---”

“Yes, my love. I’m  **_so_ ** sorry it’s taken me so long to get back---”

The girl rushes forward and wraps her arms around him, holding him tight, and she cries against his torso. He wraps his arms around her in turn and cards a hand through her hair.

“The Doctor told me you were  _ gone…” _

He sighs. “I---I was, for a while there, and I’m  **_so_ ** sorry I failed you again, my love.”

“Mum…”

“Hush now,” he pulls back and looks her over. “You’re---how long has it been, for you?”

_ “Two years,”  _ Genevieve breathes. “I’ve---” she wipes at her eyes with a fist. “I’ve been living in your TARDIS and keeping this office for the Doctor…”

His gaze sweeps over the room, taking in the lack of personal effects, and he cautiously asks, “the Doctor’s been here?”

“Yea. She’s blonde, now.” she glares at him.

“I know,” he responds. “I---I can tell you what happened later, but for now… come with me. We can go anywhere you’d li---”

She crosses her arms, tilts her head to one side, and challenges, “does that  _ include  _ Gallifrey?”

He smiles sadly and casts his gaze to the floor. “Um… not yet, love. Things…. _ happened.  _ Gallifrey isn’t on the table.”

Geni crunches up her face, wanting to argue but afraid of upsetting him and so she turns, grabs the clock off the mantel, and turns back towards him with a small smile. “Ca’ we just sit above the Earth for a while?”

“Of course, love,” he holds a hand out to her. Twin hearts pound in his chest. Twice now has he failed his daughter and part of him fears he’ll never be able to make things right with her, that she’ll carry anger and resentment with her and perhaps worst of all, that she’ll choose to live and  _ die  _ as a human.

With a sad smile, she takes his hand.

High above the planet, the Master and his daughter sit with their legs dangling out of the TARDIS, taking in the vastness of the universe and the beautiful, blue-green surface of the planet below them.

He turns as she sobs and he wraps an arm around her, holding her tight.

“I won’t leave you again,” he promises.

She buries her face in his shoulder, thinking,  _ you can _ **_nae_ ** _ promise that. _

_ I can  _ **_try,_ ** he responds, holding her tight.

_ No more broken promises.  _


End file.
